All issues > Volume 48(8); 2005

Original Article

Korean J Pediatr. 2005;48(8):871-876. Published online August 15, 2005.

Tumor Necrosis Factor and Lymphotoxin-α Gene Polymorphism in Korean Children with Type 1 Diabetes

Jin Soon JS Suh¹, So Young SY Park¹, Min Ho MH Jung¹, Byung Kyu BK Suh¹, Tae Gyu TG Kim¹, Byung Churl BC Lee²

¹Department of Pediatrics, College of Medicine, The Catholic University of Korea, Seoul, Korea
²Department of Microbiology and Immunology, College of Medicine, The Catholic University of Korea

Correspondence Byung Churl BC Lee ,Email: byungcl@catholic.ac.kr

Abstract

Purpose
: Recently, it was reported that tumor necrosis factor(TNF) and lymphotoxin-α(LT-α) gene regions might be a susceptible loci to type 1 diabetes in Japanese. The purpose of this study was to investigate the association of TNF and LT-α gene polymorphisms with disease susceptibility in Korean children with type 1 diabetes.
Methods
: Forty-nine Korean children with type 1 diabetes(29 girls and 20 boys) and 94 healthy Koreans were investigated in this study. Genotyping for -857T/C polymorphism in the TNF promoter region and LT-α gene polymorphism were performed by PCR-RFLP(restriction fragment length polymorphism). TNF promoter -1031C/T polymorphism was detected by allele-specific PCR.
Results
: The distribution of the -857T/C and -1031C/T genotype in the TNF promoter region was not different between diabetic children and the controls. The frequency of TT genotype in the distribution of TNF -1031C/T polymorphism in diabetic children with diabetic ketoacidosis(DKA) at diagnosis was significantly lower than those without DKA(P<0.05). No significant difference in the distribution of LT-α gene polymorphism was observed between diabetic children and the controls. There was no association between clinical characteristics of type 1 diabetes and LT-α gene polymorphisms.
Conclusion
: These results suggest that TNF promoter -857T/C and LT-α gene polymorphisms are not associated with susceptibility to type 1 diabetes in Korean children. TNF promoter -1031C/T polymorphism might be related to clinical manifestations(DKA) of type 1 diabetes.

Keywords :Type 1 diabetes , Gene , Polymorphism , Tumor necrosis factor , Lymphotoxin-α